President Trump and the Art of the Deal

One of the bizarre features of much of the criticism of President Trump is how completely wrong-headed it is. For example, most Leftist sites on the internet depict Trump as a maniac eager to start a war. How they will deal with this should be amusing:

President Donald Trump agreed on Thursday to meet with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un by May after Kim pledged to refrain from further nuclear tests and move toward denuclearization, according to South Korean officials.

The surprise announcement was made by South Korean National Security Advisor Chung Eui-Yong in a short statement outside the White House. The White House later said no firm timetable was set.

Chung said that in recent talks with South Korea, Kim Jong Un “expressed eagerness to meet President Trump as soon as possible.”

A senior administration official said the sentiments from Kim were conveyed verbally to Trump during a briefing in the Oval Office at the White House on Thursday, denying the existence of a physical letter from the South Korean envoy to the president, which was reported earlier.

The White House confirmed that Trump would accept Kim’s invitation to meet, but a senior administration official told reporters on a call after the announcement that “at this point, we’re not even talking about negotiations.”

“What we’re talking about is an invitation by the leader of North Korea to meet face to face with the president of the United States,” the official said. “The president has accepted that invitation.”

Go here to read the rest. One of the keys to understanding Trump is that he views himself as a master negotiator. Virtually everything he does is an attempt to drive his adversaries to the negotiating table where he thinks he can prevail. This really should be obvious, but the Left and the Media have had precious little inclination to examine Trump dispassionately, and that lack of such analysis has helped Trump throughout his career. Much of what Trump does I suspect is an attempt to cause his adversaries to misunderstand him. Trump fans believe that he is a genius always playing fifth dimensional chess. I don’t believe that, but I do think he is sharper than most of his critics and adversaries, and that has worked to Trump’s advantage, time and time again over a very long career.

Donald R. McClarey

Cradle Catholic. Active in the pro-life movement since 1973. Father of three and happily married for 35 years. Small town lawyer and amateur historian. Former president of the board of directors of the local crisis pregnancy center for a decade.

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10 Comments

I’m still rather annoyed with all the “Trump wants tarries!” talk, when the only statements I can find from him are more like “if you are gonna tax our stuff coming in, we’re going to tax yours exactly the same!”

I know it violates a key faith component for some free trade theories, but I have trouble being upset with it.

I am against tariffs in theory, but threatening tariffs in order to curb trade misbehavior, such as dumping, by some of our trading partners is another matter. Once again Trump simply wants negotiations on trade to cut a better deal for the US.

Jadgish Baghwati, who is a promoter of liberal trade regimes, has offered that trade treaties are now humbug. Per Baghwati, and actual free trade deal would be ten pages long. The 1,000 page lallapaloozas are actually compendia of special-interest carve-outs that no one understands except (perhaps) the lobbyists jonesing for the carve-outs. Tariffs in our time are too light to make much of a difference one way or another.

The willingness of Trump to buck McConnell and Ryan and impose these tariffs is big news. Yet all the press is talking about is Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal and the payments by Cohen and whatever NDA Trump had with her. The American people care more about JOBS than tramps.

First of all, Trump’s willingness to meet Kim directly elevates the despot’s status and lowers that of our president. Before anyone makes comparison to Reagan meeting with Gorbachev, the USSR and North Korea are far from comparable in terms of importance.

Secondly, Trump’s embarrassing performance during the on-camera “bipartisan” meetings on DACA and gun control demonstrate Trump’s prowess as a negotiator are highly overrated, despite what many of his sycophants in the conservative media say. It showed a President Trump willing to cave. It’s Negotiations 0101 that you don’t signal what you willing to compromise going into a negotiation. But apparently Trump doesn’t understand that.

“First of all, Trump’s willingness to meet Kim directly elevates the despot’s status and lowers that of our president. Before anyone makes comparison to Reagan meeting with Gorbachev, the USSR and North Korea are far from comparable in terms of importance.”

Not at all. If Trump accomplishes a nuclear disarmed North Korea he is a hero. If not, the military option remains and South Korea is mollified that Trump made the effort prior to a war that might well leave Seoul in ruins.

“Secondly, Trump’s embarrassing performance during the on-camera “bipartisan” meetings on DACA and gun control demonstrate Trump’s prowess as a negotiator are highly overrated,”

Not by those two incidents. Trump has transferred the failure to compromise on DACA to the Democrats and got the Democrats fighting among themselves. In regard to gun control Trump has kept the Democrats off balance and they doubtless will fail to sign on to legislation to arm teachers, which is Trump’s main goal.

President Trump’s adversaries continue to make the same mistake over and over again. They underestimate the man they hate. Whether it is the media, Democrats, Hollywood, the NFL players, never Trumpers like Kristol and the gasbag George Will….or even the Bush clan, who was silent about Obumber and made nice with the Clintons…all they can do is bring themselves into a rage because Donald Trump had the audacity to run for president and get elected.

I don’t think the Democrat Party has ever looked more breathtakingly stupid in my nearly 55 years as they have since 2016.

To Penguins Fan: Amen, you nailed it. All my life (and I’m about nine years older than you are) I have marveled at how thoroughly and consistently the Democrats have out-gamed the GOP on nearly every front even when the Republicans were in power in Washington. The few exceptions such as Reagan’s tax cuts and his teaming up with Thatcher and JP-2 to defeat the USSR were just Reagan being Reagan, and had little or nothing to do with the GOP establishment. Now, finally, the Dems look stupid, too. It’s truly amazing, the level of denial of the obvious being displayed by both the Left and the neo-con/establishment/”Never-Trump” Republican types.
If there is one major adjustment to my thinking that has been caused by the 2016 election and it’s aftermath thus far, it is the realization that for all those years since Reagan, and likely many years before his presidency, all the unflattering things people like Pat Buchanan have said about the GOP elites have been true. I sincerely hope that Trump’s election (and, God willing, re-election) will be the death knell for the GOP and spark the birth of a party that really represents normal, ordinary folks. Stranger things have already happened.